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Failure Prompts Yet Another Proposed AD

Lycoming is casting its recall net a little wider for engines with potentially faulty crankshafts and the FAA is reinforcing that with yet another proposed AD. Since 2002, Lycoming has replaced hundreds of cranks containing suspected metallurgical faults and now nearly 400 more have been added to the list. In a Nov. 30 supplement (check there to see if your engine is affected) to a mandatory service bulletin issued last July, Lycoming said a single failure (no accident involved) prompted the expanded recall. The Notice of Proposed Rulemaking issued by the FAA on Jan. 6 duplicates the company's call for the affected engines to be repaired within 50 hours or six months, whichever comes first. The MSB supplement and NPRM affect (L)O-360, (L)IO-360, and AEIO-360 models. Most of this batch of 391 suspect cranks went into 308 engines manufactured by Lycoming. Some of the remainder may have been used in overhauls or may be sitting on stockroom shelves. The FAA says its NPRM affects 282 engines in service in the U.S. and the types of aircraft affected range from Cessnas, Beeches and Pipers to some obscure European and Asian aircraft and even a couple of blimps.

Question of the Week

Picture of the Week

As aviation photos go, this was the best this week but there are some great beauty shots when you click through. In the meantime, congratulations to Daniel Gillette for this very nice photo he calls Sunset Pitch-Out. The photo is copyrighted by Gillette.